


The Total Agony of Being in Love

by sovvannight



Series: The Trouble With Love Is [1]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Academic competition, Alternate Universe - Love Actually Fusion, Alternate Universe - Middle School, Christmas, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Inspired by Love Actually, Olicity is Endgame, Oliver and Felicity are the Same Age
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-06
Updated: 2019-12-26
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:28:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21689125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sovvannight/pseuds/sovvannight
Summary: Eleven-year-old Oliver Queen is sad because his mother died, of course he is.  But he's also sad because he's fallen in love with Felicity Smoak, the new girl at school, who he thinks is out of his league.  His stepdad helps him come up with a plan to get Felicity to notice him, and maybe she's not so out of his league after all...
Relationships: Felicity Smoak/Carter Bowen (brief), Oliver Queen/Felicity Smoak
Series: The Trouble With Love Is [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1563523
Comments: 25
Kudos: 163





	1. Chapter 1

_September 1996_

Oliver slipped out of his room and down the hall, headed for the kitchen where he hoped to grab a snack without running into anyone. He paused near the top of the steps as voices drifted up to him from the entryway—Walter and…was that Mrs. Loring? Here with more paperwork for his stepdad to sign, Oliver guessed. 

He crept down a few more steps, staying close to the wall so he wouldn’t be visible over the railing. He wanted to make sure she wasn’t there to report that one of his relatives had decided to fight the custody arrangements laid out in Moira Queen-Steel’s will—arrangements that kept him living in the Queen mansion with his stepdad and baby half-sister. His uncle Mark and Grandma and Grandpa Dearden might think he should live with one of them, but he didn’t want to leave his sister, his home, his friends, or _her_.

Walter’s voice finally became distinct enough for Oliver to understand what he was saying, so he sat down on the stairs to eavesdrop.

“I’m just worried about Oliver. He stays in his room all the time, and I mean _all_ the time. And then when he does come out, it's obvious he's been crying. I wonder if I did the right thing.”

Mrs. Loring replied, “You did. Being in his own home will help him recover better than forcing him to move away from everything familiar to go live with one side of his family or another. This was Moira’s wish, and I think she was right.”

“I just wish I knew what to say to him. I didn’t want to push, didn’t want him to feel like I was trying to replace Robert, but now I’m all he’s got.”

“Give it time. I’ll be by next week to pick up that paperwork.”

“Thank you, Jean.” The door opened and shut, and Oliver scrambled up and walked down the remaining one-and-a-half flights of stairs.

“Oliver!” Walter said, too heartily, as Oliver descended the last few stairs. “How was school today?”

“OK.”

Walter took a deep breath. “But you don’t seem OK. I know you’re sad about your mom. I’m sad, too. But it seems like maybe something else is wrong.”

Oliver sat back down on the bottom stairs. He rested his chin on one hand as he looked at the floor. He should talk to Walter so he could stop worrying, shouldn’t he? “You really want to know?”

“I really want to know.”

“Even though you won’t be able to help?”

“Even if that's the case.”

“OK. Well, the truth is, I'm in love. And there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Walter laughed. “Well, I'm a little relieved. I thought it'd be something worse.”

“Worse than the total agony of being in love?”

“Er...No, you're right. Total agony.” Walter’s shoulders drooped, and Oliver could tell he was thinking about Moira. But then he put on what Oliver thought of as his boardroom face, where he was about to come up with a solution to fix everything. “What’s this paragon’s name?”

“Felicity. Felicity Smoak,” Oliver breathed out, feeling a flutter in his stomach just saying her name.

“And you can’t just talk to her? You’re a popular boy.”

“No, she’s friends with the smart kids, not the jocks. And I can never catch her alone.”

Walter pondered this, hands clasped behind his back as he wandered around the foyer. “Do you have classes with her? Could you work on a project together?”

“No, only gym, and they mostly split the boys and girls up, and math, where I look like an idiot.” Oliver hung his head in shame.

“What about after school? Is she in band, or clubs?”

“Just the academic competition team.”

Walter replied, like it was the most reasonable thing in the world, “So, join that. Girls like it when you show an interest in their interests.”

Oliver laughed. “I’m not smart enough for that.”

“Of course you are. Can you specialize? Because your math scores may not be the best, but your Spanish teacher was complimentary about your skill at learning vocabulary, you read above your grade level, and you seem to remember books and movies well when you’re retelling the stories to Thea. Being good at memorization should be helpful to the team.”

Oliver felt hopeful about his chances with Felicity for the first time. “Maybe that would work.”

“Find out when they meet and let me know so I can arrange for Ricky to pick you up later that day.”

“OK,” Oliver decided with a nod. “I’ll do it.”

* * * * *

The final bell for the day rang and Oliver’s heart started pounding. He and Tommy walked out of English class and to their lockers, Oliver halfway listening as Tommy babbled about the Rockets’ chances in that evening’s game. They grabbed the books they’d need for tonight’s homework and headed toward the front circle where their parents’ drivers would be waiting.

Oliver stopped on the steps, causing Tommy to stop as well when he noticed Oliver had crouched down and opened his backpack. “Shit, I forgot my math book,” Oliver said, hoping he sounded annoyed.

“We can go back and get it.”

“No, no, I know it’s your night for cello lessons. I don’t want to make you late. You go on, and I’ll go back and get it.”

Tommy looked at him strangely, but in the end he just shrugged. “OK, see ya.” He turned around and continued down the stairs without a backward glance toward the black BMW driven by the Merlyn family’s chauffeur.

Oliver made his way to Mrs. Hannon’s classroom in the seventh-grade wing where the academic team was meeting. When he tried to slip in the back door, the teacher broke off what she was saying. “Oliver Queen, what are you doing here?”

All eyes turned to him, including one very pretty set of grey-blue eyes behind wire-rimmed glass that he was totally not paying attention to at all. He stammered, “Uh, I thought I’d check this out, see if I could help. Do you need an English and history guy? And languages, Spanish and Russian?”

Mrs. Hannon looked surprised, then thoughtful. “Actually, yes. We’ve got math and science pretty well covered.” She waved at the group of kids, which, yeah, he mostly recognized as the ‘good at math’ kids from his own and past classes. “But no one has been particularly interested in all the memorization required for the history section, since that’s not something sixth graders have studied all that much.”

“I can do that.”

“And you’re willing to work your way through a reading list of classics, even poetry?”

He nodded, and she said, “Let us finish math practice, but then you and I can talk.”

Oliver took a seat at the back of the classroom as Mrs. Hannon went over how to answer a particular type of math problem, then had each of them work through an example on the board. She had Oliver go last, and by the time she called his name his palms were sweating and his stomach was tied in knots.

“OK, Oliver, your two expressions are x+y and x*y.”

“OK.” He slowly wrote the two expressions on the board. “OK, so, first I do small numbers, so, 2+3 is 5, 2*3 is 6, the second one is bigger. Uh, a big number and a small number, so 2+100=102, 2*100=200, so the second one is still bigger. Umm…” He paused, trying to remember the next step.

“Fraction,” was whispered behind him, although why she bothered to whisper when the whole group could hear her he didn’t know. He turned to see Felicity smiling encouragingly from her seat in the first row.

“Right. Fraction. So, uh, 10+1/2=10 1/2, but 10*1/2=5, so the first one is bigger. So the answer is, we can’t determine.”

“Correct!” The teacher looked slightly surprised, and Oliver didn’t know if he should feel insulted or just accept that he and Tommy spend way too much time goofing off in class if teachers whose class he doesn’t attend know not to expect much.

After the math practice they did some work with vocabulary where, again, Mrs. Hannon seemed surprised that Oliver either knew what the words meant or was able to guess based on a similar Spanish word, which led the teacher into a mini-lecture on recognizing Latin roots. Finally, she passed out homework for next week and let them go, stopping Oliver on the way out to give him some extra vocabulary to memorize and tell him she would work up history and literature reading lists for him.

Her stopping him meant he was behind the rest of the students, and barely caught a glimpse of Felicity getting into a dusty yellow jeep as he stepped outside.

Walter checked in with him that night over dinner. They ate in the kitchen since Thea had a habit of throwing food over the side of her high chair, and Mom wasn’t there to insist on eating in the dining room ‘like civilized people.’

“So how was it? Any contact with her?”

“She was there. She helped me when I got stuck doing a problem on the board, but that’s it. I stayed behind to talk to the teacher so I didn’t have a chance to really talk to her.”

“Next time. That’s excellent progress! And the club itself, how is that?”

“OK, actually. I was able to impress Mrs. Hannon a couple of times. I don’t think she had a very high opinion of me, but that’s my fault. She gave me some extra vocab handouts and is going to give me some reading lists so I can be the team’s history and literature expert.”

“A lot to keep you busy.”

“Yeah.” Busy, and in the same room with Felicity, he thought.

* * * * *

By the time Oliver had reached his locker the next morning, he’d noticed three or four people giving him odd looks. He dumped the afternoon’s books and folders in his locker, then slammed the door shut to reveal Tommy leaning on the next locker over.

“So, you’re a nerd now? Like a dozen people have asked me if you’re really in some after-school nerd club. I laughed off the first couple, but now I’m thinking it’s true.”

Before he could say anything, a group of guys from their class came along, led by his nemesis, Max Fuller. “Oh look, it’s the nerd. You need to borrow a tissue to wipe your face after all that brownnosing?” He cackled at his own joke, and his friends laughed in unison.

Oliver decided to ignore them and answer Tommy, embellishing in a burst of inspiration. “It was Walter’s idea. He thought it might make me feel better if I did something that would make my mom proud, if- if she could see it.”

That quieted the crowd somewhat, and when Max jeered, ‘Aww, he misses his mommy!’ one of his friends dragged him away. “Too far, Max.”

“I know what you mean,” Tommy said softly. “Sometimes I imagine my mom can hear me play. She always loved it. Even when I was just playing scales or something simple, she would always hang out and listen.” Tommy patted him awkwardly on the shoulder, making Oliver feel guilty as hell. Was he really using his mother’s death for sympathy points so he didn’t have to admit that this was all a ploy to impress a girl?

Speaking of which, the crowd in the hallway parted to give him a glimpse of Felicity, walking by with a few of her friends. She smiled at him fleetingly before her attention was caught by one of her friends gesturing excitedly as she talked. His heart fluttered, and he fought against reacting as he basked in the moment: Felicity Smoak had noticed him.


	2. Chapter 2

Oliver sat in the window seat in his room, studying a timeline of the Civil War. He still had to work on his actual homework, but the weekly academic team meeting was tomorrow and he wanted to be quiz-ready on this era in history. After looking over the list of events several times, he decided to look at some of the books he had on the war—he thought one of them had a map in it, and it would help if he could envision troop movements to understand the pattern of battles.

A knock on the door interrupted his studying a short time later. “Oliver, it’s time for dinner,” Walter called through the door.

“I’m not hungry,” he called back as he continued to flip through his books.

“Raisa made your favorite,” Walter said.

“Not hungry!” Oliver shouted, now feeling a little annoyed. He just needed to concentrate, and how was he supposed to do that with all these interruptions? Their first competition was next week, and even though it was just a trial run, he didn’t want to let the team down.

And in the end, he didn’t. Chesterbrooke won the sixth-grade division at the informal meet organized by several of the private schools in Starling City, and while their math and science performance was excellent, their vocabulary and history knowledge, spearheaded by Oliver, also played a big part in the team’s win.

Of course, it was a lot lower key for the sixth-grade group than the high schoolers who were looking for wins to put on their college applications. But Oliver had still felt the pressure of not letting the team down, and he’d felt a thrill when they’d advanced to the semifinal and then the final round. In the car on the way home, he smiled as he remembered Felicity in competition mode—how she was so serious during the tests, but she’d squealed and jumped up and down when they won. She’d high-fived the people around her, which meant their hands had touched. He flexed his hand, trying to hold onto the sensation of that fleeting contact.

* * * * *

A few weeks later the team had its final practice before their first real competition. Mrs. Hannon had led them through a mock quiz and they’d done well. She’d given them a final list of items to study between now and Saturday and sent them on their way. Oliver was one of the last students out the door, so he saw most of the students scatter to their parents’ waiting cars. But Felicity stood on the sidewalk in front of the school, biting her lip as she looked at the cars parked around the circular driveway. Her parents’ yellow jeep was conspicuously absent among the mostly black and silver sedans and SUVs.

Ricky and the family’s Mercedes sedan was soon one of the few cars left in the circle. “Uh, is your mom not coming?” he asked as he walked up to Felicity.

“Guess not. I guess she had to work late.” She sighed and hitched her backpack over her shoulder before starting to walk around the edge of the circle toward the street.

Oliver scrambled after her. “So what are you going to do?”

“I’ll take the bus.”

“But they’re all gone already.”

Felicity stopped and turned to look at him in confusion. “Not a school bus, the city bus. There’s an SCTA bus stop two blocks from here. I can ride most of the way home—I just transfer once to the 2H and I can get off across the street from our apartment complex.”

“You’re allowed to do that by yourself?” Oliver was aghast.

“Of course. We can’t all have family chauffeurs to drive us around.”

Oliver made a snap decision. “Well, today you can. C’mon.” He gestured toward his family’s sedan and started walking toward it, turning to beckon her forward when he didn’t hear steps behind him. Ricky had gotten out of the car so he’d be available to open the car door for Oliver. “Ricky, this is my…friend, Felicity Smoak. Is it OK if we drop her off at her house on the way home?”

“I don’t see why not. Where do you live, Miss Felicity?”

She smiled and shook her head. “Just Felicity. And I live on Jarrett Street, between Concord and Haight. Do you know where that is?”

“I do—over by SCU, right?”

“Yeah. A lot of our neighbors are college kids.”

“It’s practically on our way. Hop in, you two.” Ricky shut the door behind them after Oliver had slid into the back seat of the car after Felicity. 

As Ricky started up the car, Oliver watched Felicity out of the corner of his eye. Felicity was looking around the car with a little smile on her face, then reached down to run her fingers over the leather seats.

“No wading through fast-food wrappers,” she said. “No musty smell from upholstery that’s older than me.”

“Uh, I guess it is nice,” Oliver said cautiously.

“It is. You should count your blessings.”

“I don’t think about it much. My family is just my family.”

“Yeah, that’s definitely true,” Felicity said on a sigh. “Family is family.”

“I’m sure…you could get there someday if you wanted. You’re so smart, I bet you could do whatever you set your mind to and be successful.” He turned to look at her fully, seeing her surprised expression.

“I didn’t know you even knew my full name. I didn’t think I’d made any kind of impression on you.”

“Of course you did. I…” This was it: this was his chance to tell her how he felt. But instead, he floundered. “I mean, you’ve saved my butt multiple times—I just get up to the board to do a math problem and I freeze. I’m so grateful for your help.” His heart sank and he silently berated himself for chickening out.

“Well, I mean, I heard what you said about joining the team, and I get it. My dad left when I was seven. He’s not looking down on me from the world to come or anything, but he was the one who first taught me about computers, and sometimes I think, if he found us again I want him to be impressed by how much I’ve learned.”

“You know about computers? Like, you’re good at games?”

“Well, yeah, but I want to create games, and other stuff, not just use them. And I like building computers, buying the parts and putting them together myself.”

“That sounds really cool!”

“Oh, it is!” She proceeded to, well, babble a bit, and Oliver barely understood what she was talking about, but he still enjoyed the way her eyes sparkled, her hands waved about for emphasis, her lips curled into a smile as she recounted some programming mishap…very full, kissable lips, Oliver noticed.

He looked away to avoid embarrassing himself, and that caused Felicity to break off mid-sentence. “I’m boring you. Sorry. My mom tells me all the time, ‘Felicity, not everyone is interested in all that techy stuff.’ ”

“Oh, no, it really does sound cool. Maybe, uh, maybe you could show me sometime?”

Her eyebrows rose. “Maybe. The computers in the library have poor security. But would you really want to be seen socializing with me? You seem to have survived ‘nerd club’ with your social standing intact, so far.”

“Yeah. Max tried his ‘Little Orphan Oliver’ thing, but then I punched him in the face and he stopped.”

“Good. He deserved it,” she said with a sneer.

“What’s he call you?”

Felicity sighed. “Four eyes, mostly. ‘Where are your boobs, little girl?’ And apparently, my shoes and backpack came from Goodwill. But they didn’t, I mean they’re from Walmart, which probably wouldn’t be much better to him, but at least they’re new.”

“I should punch him again.” He straightened up as he had an idea. “Better yet, _you_ should punch him. He’d never live it down, getting beat up by a girl.”

“I don’t think I could do that. What if I got kicked out of school? I mean, I might be leaving, anyway—”

“What?”

Felicity groaned. “I should _not_ have said that out loud. I, um, I had applied to a bunch of schools last summer after that article was in the paper about me qualifying for Mensa, but my application was too late for this really cool school in Boston—”

“Boston!”

“—that’s math and science-focused and you can actually take classes at MIT your senior year, can you imagine? That’s like my dream college. Anyway, I missed the deadline to apply for financial aid so it didn’t seem possible, but we heard from them last week and it looks like some kids are dropping out, so there might be an opening for me with a scholarship after the winter break.”

“Oh.” Oliver was speechless with horror. She wanted to move all the way across the country? He realized the silence had gone on too long, and stammered, “That’s- that’s great. Not for us, obviously, we’ll miss you on the team, and uh, but, if that’s your dream, then it’s great that you’ve maybe got that opportunity. Didn’t I just say that you could accomplish great things?” He smiled weakly, hoping he sounded sincere.

“Well, thanks. Um, it’s not a done deal yet, so…if you don’t mind, could you not say anything to people at school? I’d be embarrassed if the New England STEM Academy changes its mind, and then Chesterbrooke feels slighted that I considered leaving.”

“Sure, it’ll be our secret.”

“Thanks. Oh, we’re almost home.” Felicity’s attention was caught by the street they turned onto. “It’s up ahead, on the right, University Heights Apartments.

Ricky pulled into the neighborhood and followed Felicity’s directions to her building. Oliver looked around with interest, because none of his friends lived in apartments. Her building was smaller than his family’s mansion, and looked a little rundown with its peeling paint and cracked sidewalks. Most of the people he saw looked like college students, a few of whom had stopped to stare at the town car.

“Lookin’ good, Felicity,” one of them called out as they got out of the car.

She waved, but then rolled her eyes when she turned back to Oliver. “You’d think they never saw a clean, new car before. Well, anyway, thanks for the ride. I’ll see you on Saturday! Well, and at school, too, of course, between now and then. Bye!”

Before Oliver could reply, she turned and dashed down the sidewalk toward her building. She appeared on the landing of the open stairway in the middle of the building, waving again before continuing upwards.

Oliver tried to sort out his feelings on the way home. Because on the one hand, they’d had an actual conversation, and he didn’t think he’d embarrassed himself too badly. On the other…Boston was thousands of miles away. If she moved there, he’d probably never see her again. What was he going to do?

* * * * *

Oliver tried to put Felicity’s possible relocation out of his mind and just focus on studying for the final few days before the competition. He woke up on Saturday feeling nervous, but excited. He’d learned so much in the past weeks, and they’d done well in practices. Surely they’d do well today. Plus, he’d see Felicity, and maybe he could find a time to discreetly ask her if there was any news about Boston. At the back of his mind he wondered if she would want to stay if they won, to see how they could get as a team.

And maybe, if she could get to know him better…Walter said he should just tell her how he feels, but Oliver was afraid. She’d been impressed with his family’s car but still didn’t seem like a girl who would be mostly interested in his money. But he didn’t know if she’d be interested romantically in someone like him, either.

Walter dropped him off in front of the school, where an activity bus was taking the sixth through eighth graders to this weekend’s school district-level competition. The eighth-graders boarded the bus first, taking the back seats. He hoped to snag a seat next to Felicity when the sixth-graders boarded, but ended up sitting next to Ray, the only other guy on the sixth-grade team. Ray droned on about his study strategy for the last few days, but Oliver mostly tuned him out.

When Felicity’s laugh cut through the din of conversation, he glanced back casually and saw that she was having an animated conversation with Carter Bowen, a seventh-grader. Carter was the kid his mom had always held up as an example to him—perfect attendance awards, straight As, still progressing toward Eagle Scout while Oliver and Tommy had dropped out after a year in Cub Scouts. Yeah, Oliver pretty much hated the guy, and the fact that Felicity seemed to find him pretty entertaining just upped the annoyance factor.

For the rest of the trip, he would occasionally catch momentary fragments of Felicity and Carter’s conversation, but not enough to follow it. Felicity sounded excited, and she was managing to get a word in edgewise with Carter, who in Oliver’s experience liked to talk about himself. Oliver couldn’t imagine Carter saying anything remotely interesting, but maybe he acted like a normal human around girls instead of a robot suck-up.

Felicity and Carter continued to chat between rounds of the competition when the academic team returned to their assigned classroom. The seventh-grade team lost in the second round, so from then on they were hanging around, dashing Oliver’s hopes of having a private conversation with Felicity to find out if she’d heard from the school in Boston. 

The eighth-grade team lost during the semifinals, leaving only the sixth-grade team with a chance at winning. In the final round, Oliver led the team to a vocabulary win, only missing one word out of 50. Felicity helped them ace the math section—she was the only one able to work on the final few problems because she had worked ahead and knew more algebra than the rest of them.

When they returned to their room with their certificates for winning the sixth-grade school district competition, the room erupted into applause. Oliver gathered up his things in a rush, hoping to walk with Felicity to the bus, but Carter immediately came over to her and started whispering in her ear. She smiled, nodded vigorously, then threw her arms around him. When Oliver finally caught up to Felicity as they waited for their bus, she and Carter were holding hands.

“You’re going out with him?” Oliver asked.

“Yeah.” Felicity beamed up at Carter, who was looking even more smug than usual.

“Oh. Congratulations?” Oliver tried for a statement but knew he wasn’t sounding sincere. 

The bus pulled up in front of them then, and Oliver boarded in a daze. He’d blown it. He’d waited too long to tell Felicity how he felt, and now it was too late. Thankfully, his seatmate McKenna was happy to talk to her friends in the seat across the aisle, leaving him to brood. By the time the bus arrived back at Chesterbrooke, Oliver was despondent. He trudged up to Walter and took Thea from him when she leaned out of Walter’s arms toward him with an excited, ‘Owwie!’

“So, how did you do?” Walter asked as they walked to the car.

“We won,” Oliver replied while trying to sound enthused.

“You did? Congratulations!” Walter took Thea back and strapped her into the car seat occupying the middle of the back seat while Oliver walked around and got in the car to sit on the other side. Once they were off, Walter asked, “So if you won, why do you look so sad?”

“It’s Felicity. She, she and Carter Bowen started talking on the bus and all during breaks, and now they’re going out! I was too slow and missed my chance with her, plus I didn’t even get a chance to ask about Boston.”

“What about Boston?”

“I didn’t tell you—after practice this week, when I drove her home, or had Ricky drive her, she said that another school she applied to might come through with a scholarship—it’s math and science-focused, in Boston near her dream college.

“She might be gone in a couple of months, and now she’s going to be preoccupied with that jerk Carter Bowen for the short time she has left in Starling. I should’ve said something that day in the car, I just felt stupid with Ricky sitting there listening to us.”

“Well, perhaps if this Carter is as much of a jerk as you say, Felicity will see the light and dump him.”

Oliver hung his head despondently.

“I know what this situation calls for,” Walter said. “Step on it, Ricky. We need Kate and we need Leo, and we need them now.” The reference to his secret favorite movie made him smile. And maybe if Jack and Rose could get together, there was hope for him and Felicity after all.

* * * * *

Oliver didn’t give up on the academic team, because he couldn’t resist any chance he had to be near Felicity. She was friendly with him but distant, and Oliver hated it but couldn’t stay away.

Tommy, oddly enough, after getting mad at Oliver for wanting to study rather than play video games, had decided to study along with Oliver. Oliver was slightly less productive when Tommy studied at his house, but at the same time they had both brought up all their grades—Oliver suspected he would get a C in math but Bs and maybe even an A or two in everything else. Who would’ve ever thought Oliver Queen would almost be a candidate for the honor roll?

Felicity and Carter broke up via a screaming match between fifth and sixth periods, a couple of weeks before the northwest California regional competition and their winter break. As she loudly proclaimed to everyone who would listen that, ‘all guys are scum, and love is a lie,’ Oliver decided to give her some space to recover. She hadn’t said anything to the team about leaving, so Oliver was hoping that meant she’d dropped the plan to move to Boston.

At the last practice before their next competition, Mrs. Hannon explained the differences from their first competition. “Starling still hosts the meet, because we’re the largest city in the region. So we’ll still be at Lincoln High School, but this time, since parents and chaperones have come from farther away, the competition allows an audience. Therefore, we don’t use the activity bus, particularly since this is the only grade participating in the middle grades regional. If your parents are unable to drive you to the school on Saturday, please arrange to drive with a friend, or let me know and I will arrange for a ride. Good luck, and I will see you all at 9 am on Saturday.”

Oliver stopped Felicity on the way out of the school. “Do you need a ride on Saturday? I mean, if your mom has to work or something?”

“No, thanks—Mom took off work. She’s excited ‘to see me shine like the genius I am.’ That’s me quoting her, not calling myself a genius, although…” She shrugged. “Anyway, she’ll drive me and be in the audience. She wants to meet the team, too, which makes me nervous. Mom can be a bit much.”

“She’s your mom, I’m sure she’s great.” Oliver sobered. “Listen, I was wondering—”

McKenna and Elizabeth marched up to them and interrupted. Elizabeth said, “Felicity, can you come talk to us? We…need your advice on something.” They gave Oliver an odd look as they dragged Felicity away, and Oliver wondered if they were trying to protect her from him. Maybe they thought she was rebounding and making a bad decision? He really didn’t think he had that much of a reputation—he’d been too busy studying to do much flirting lately. He’d just have to try and talk to her on Saturday in between rounds of the competition.

He suffered through the final few days of school before they broke for Christmas break, filled with busywork and movie watching because students and teachers alike were mostly focused on the upcoming holidays. His own family was sticking around on Saturday for Oliver’s competition, then leaving for Christmas at Grandma and Grandpa Queen’s in Coast City. He hoped Felicity had something fun planned, and that she wouldn’t have to spend the whole break alone while her mom worked.

He pictured her home alone, hunched over a computer and eating fast food instead of the giant turkey dinner he’d enjoy with his family. Ignoring the movie currently playing in his Social Studies class, he imagined a different scenario—Felicity and her mom as he imagined her to be, basically an older version of Felicity, driving up to the Queen mansion in their jeep, spending Christmas Eve with them, unwrapping presents… 

The bell rang just as he was imagining Felicity standing underneath the mistletoe, and him leaning forward to press his lips against hers. He gathered up his books hoping he wasn’t blushing too obviously. Thankfully, this wasn’t a class he shared with Tommy, or he’d be teasing Oliver mercilessly at this point. He definitely wasn’t ready to talk to his best friend about Felicity, but maybe, if things went perfectly on Saturday, he’d be able to introduce him to his new girlfriend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to say, Tommy always plays the cello in my fics because of "a song in the back of my soul (that no one knows)" by shipreally (https://archiveofourown.org/works/3619800), a nice little Smoaking Billionaires fic, if you're into that kind of thing. :)


	3. Chapter 3

The Saturday of the regional competition was cold and overcast. Walter drove Oliver to the same high school where they’d held the district-level meet six weeks earlier. Anticipating a long day, they’d left Thea behind with Raisa. Tommy had offered to come to cheer him on but Oliver had discouraged him—he still felt self-conscious about his “nerdy hobby” and wasn’t so sure he wanted witnesses, just in case they crashed and burned.

Walter and Oliver walked into the school and followed signs to the library where they checked in. Walter left for the school’s theater, where the final rounds of the competition would be held, and Oliver followed the map he’d been given to Chesterbrooke’s designated home classroom. His teammates greeted him, and he took a minute to marvel that he, Oliver Queen, was actually accepted by this group of kids he never even would’ve talked to if it wasn’t for Felicity, and Walter. Speaking of Felicity…Oliver looked around but didn’t see her.

When he asked Elizabeth, who seemed to be her closest friend on the team, she said, “Felicity‘s mom is a little disorganized, so she might be a little late.”

“The competition starts in 5 minutes, though!” Ray interjected, having overheard her response.

“She’ll be here. It’s important to her, too!” Elizabeth replied while rolling her eyes.

A few minutes later, the door banged open and Felicity rushed in, breathless. “Sorry I’m late. Mom couldn’t decide what to wear.”

Before she could even take off her coat, someone from the competition arrived to escort them to their first round.

There were twenty two districts in their region, so the cafeteria was the only space large enough to hold that many competitors. Oliver and his team seated themselves at one of the round tables placed around the room.

The first round was a written test—each student would spend the first 45 minutes completing the test in silence, and then the team would have 15 minutes to combine their answers. This made it relatively stress-free for Oliver because he could skip the math and science sections entirely and focus on vocabulary, reading comprehension, and social studies. In the end, even after checking his work on “his” sections, he still had time to do a few math problems, just for fun. Wait, math was fun? He shook his head at himself. But it was fun, when he could look at a problem and know exactly what to do instead of panicking.

When the proctor called out the 15-minute warning, he passed his test to Felicity, along with everyone else on the team. She laid them all out and grabbed their clean master copy. The team huddled around her for whispered consultations.

“OK, we agree on all but eight of the questions. Let’s talk through the options.” Most of them were math questions, and Oliver didn’t feel like he had much to contribute. Instead, he just sat back and marveled at Felicity’s assurance and her ability to manage the team and get them to come to a consensus. She worked her way through the math problems, then reached the few remaining questions in other areas. “Purled—most of us said it meant iridescent, but Oliver says it’s rippling. I know I just guessed, so I’m asking: Oliver, are you sure?”

“Yes. I remember I looked it up—it’s in _The Red Badge of Courage_ , describing the flow of a stream. I’ll show you the flashcard back in the classroom.”

“That’s good enough for me.” She looked around at the rest of the team. “Anyone want to argue for iridescent?” They shook their heads, and Oliver felt gratified that they would trust him.

They finished going over the last few questions with several minutes to spare. As they waited, Oliver could see many of the other teams were still huddled in discussion or frantically writing, and he was filled with confidence. They were smarter than these kids and had studied harder. They were going to win.

They returned to their classroom to await the results of the grading, and Mrs. Hannon asked how they thought they did.

“We aced it,” Oliver declared, and the rest of the team agreed.

“Excellent. This is only a 15-minute break, so grab a snack now if you brought one. Bathrooms are at the end of the hall. When the break is over they will call us back to the cafeteria. The five teams who advance to the second round will be announced; if we’re in that group we’ll follow them to the auditorium, otherwise we can leave. They announce the first-round winners in the auditorium, too, so your parents will know if they should stay."

Several students, including Felicity, stepped out of the room, presumably to use the bathroom.

Mrs. Hannon drew the remaining students to her to discuss the first round. Oliver told her what he could remember of the vocabulary questions while she took notes for next year’s sixth-grade team. Before Oliver knew it, one of the volunteers was there to lead them back to the cafeteria.

Oliver fell in step with Felicity. “We made it to the next round, don’t you think?”

“Oh yeah, definitely.” Felicity appeared serene until Oliver noticed her biting her lip.

“Hey, we’re going to be great at this next round. We practiced this style of questions and we’ve got it down pat.”

Felicity let out a sigh as they reached the cafeteria and sat at the same table they’d used before.

The woman who’d announced the rules of the first round of competition stepped to the front of the cafeteria. “Before we announce the teams who are advancing to the second round, all of us at Scholastic Challenge America would like to congratulate all of the competitors here today…”

Oliver tuned her out and turned his attention to Felicity, sitting across from him. She looked so pretty today. Well, she always did, but her hair was in a high ponytail that swung from side to side as she walked, and bounced up and down when she nodded, which she tended to do when she figured out the answer to a problem, so she was doing it a lot today. Static from the cold was making the light brown curls less smooth than normal, and he wondered if he could shock himself by touching her hair. Applause signaled the end of the official’s speech, snapping Oliver back to attention.

“The schools advancing to the next round are: Hamilton Middle School…”

A table across the room started cheering. ‘San Francisco STEM Magnet School, Devenford Preparatory School, and St. Andrew’s Catholic School’ resulted in similar cheers, and Oliver began to doubt until the announcer said, “And the final school to advance to the semifinals for the sixth-grade regional competition for Scholastic Challenge America is Chesterbrooke Academy.”

Felicity out the cutest ‘Woo’ as she pumped her fist into the air, making Oliver grin. McKenna pulled her into a hug, and surprisingly enough Laurel hugged him—he hadn’t even noticed who he was sitting next to. They all followed the other advancing teams out of the cafeteria and down the hall to the auditorium.

Parents of the losing teams were still filing out of the back doors to the auditorium as Chesterbrooke and the other four teams entered the room through a side door. He spotted Walter among the parents who were re-seating themselves closer to the stage. Walter waved, and so did the blonde woman standing next to him. She didn’t look familiar—the short, bright pink dress didn’t look like the typical outfit for a Chesterbrooke parent.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Felicity waving back at the woman. “That’s your mom?” he asked.

“Yeah.” She looked sheepish. “Like I said, she’s a bit much. And that’s your stepdad?”

“Yeah. I live with him and my baby sister. Half-sister,” he corrected himself as they ascended the stairs leading up to the stage. The team seated themselves at one of the five tables set so that they faced the audience.

The official stepped up to the podium in the center of the stage and tapped the microphone for attention. When the room quieted down, she began speaking. “Welcome to the second round of the sixth-grade regionals for Scholastic Challenge America 1996-7. The rules of the second round are as follows: each team will answer a series of twenty five questions, ten math and fifteen vocabulary. Feel free to collaborate as a team, but we will need your team captain to be the official spokesperson and provide your team’s final answer.”

It was funny to Oliver: at that moment that he felt exactly the same as he did at the beginning of a baseball game, or a track meet. He just wanted to win. For her, partially, he thought as he looked over at Felicity who was bouncing a little in her seat, and for the team. But also for himself.

The math questions came first, and Oliver sat back and watched with pride as Felicity led their team to one correct answer after the next. For the first few questions, each team got their question right, but then one team and then a second and a third got one wrong, leaving Chesterbrooke tied with St. Andrew’s for first place.

The two schools remained undefeated up to the tenth and final math problem.

“Team Chesterbrooke, please look at the equations on the screen and solve for x.”

They turned around to look at the screen behind them, and Felicity let out a gasp. She turned to consult her teammates. “Guys, I don’t know what that notation means. Have you ever seen it before?”

They all shook their heads.

“OK.” She took a few deep breaths. “Let’s try to guess. How do you think we would calculate it?”

Laurel, Felicity, Ray, and Li passed ideas back and forth. 

“Thirty seconds left,” the official announced.

The team decided on a strategy and worked it through. “Our answer is 12,” Felicity stated.

“I’m sorry, but that is incorrect.”

The whole team deflated, but Felicity tried to rally them, whispering, “Hey, it’s OK—the top two teams advance to the final round, and we’re second.”

But then, St. Andrew’s was asked a similar kind of question, and they also got it wrong. So Chesterbrooke and St. Andrew’s were back to being tied for first place with nine out of ten correct, with the other teams at seven or eight correct. Any team could still come back from behind and kick Chesterbrooke out of the top two if they started missing vocabulary, though, so Oliver straightened up in his seat and got ready.

They answered the first five vocabulary question without a hitch—the proctor read off the vocabulary word and the four options for the definition, and the team was in agreement on the answers. St. Andrew’s got all of their vocabulary questions correct, too, so they were still tied with Chesterbrooke for first place. 

With the sixth question, the words abruptly got harder. For the next set of five words, the rest of the team mostly wasn’t helpful—they would shrug, and Felicity would suggest an option, her grimace saying she was guessing. Four out of five times, her guess matched his. The fifth time she deferred to him as the vocabulary export, and they got all five correct. San Francisco STEM and Hamilton each missed three out of five questions, so they were effectively out of the running, while Devenford missed one. At least St. Andrew’s was also struggling, based on the amount of discussion and their body language, even if they got all five correct.

Their answers for the last five questions were pure guesses; they got one wrong, but so did St. Andrew’s. When the official announced that Chesterbrooke and St. Andrew’s would continue to the final round, the team cheered, but it was clear that they were all exhausted as Oliver was. They headed back to their classroom for a 15-minute break to allow the supporters of the three teams not continuing on to the next round to clear out and for the organizers to set the seating for the final round.

Laurel pulled out some candy canes from her backpack and started passing them out. “Here—we need a little sugar boost.”

When she got to Felicity, she waved her off. “No thanks.”

Laurel frowned. “You don’t like candy canes?”

“I don’t celebrate Christmas. I’m Jewish.”

“It’s just candy. It’s not religious.”

“Isn’t it a shepherd’s crook? Aren’t there shepherds in the story?” Felicity sounded exasperated.

Ray held out his hand. “If she doesn’t want one, I’ll take it for my brother! Problem solved!”

Once they settled down, Mrs. Hannon took the opportunity to give them some last-minute advice. “Remember, this last round is like a game show. As the team’s captain, Felicity will be in charge of hitting the buzzer. If you know the answer, tap the table to let her know. You want to get in with the buzzer before the other team, but not if you’re not sure, because we lose points for incorrect answers.

“I just want to say, this is the furthest a sixth-grade team has ever gotten in the four years I’ve been the faculty advisor for the academic team. I’m so very proud of you all—the way you’re coming together as a team, and the way each of you has grown academically.” She grinned. “Now, go kick St. Andrew’s butts!”


	4. Chapter 4

One of the proctors knocked on the door on the heels of Mrs. Hannon’s speech, there to lead them back to the auditorium. They circled around rather than entering through the main doors like they did previously—the proctor led them through the backstage until they reached the wings. 

The team waited as an official from the competition gave a speech. When she asked the audience to give a big round of applause to the two finalists for sixth-grade district champions, St. Andrew’s and Chesterbrooke, their proctor waved them forward to one of the two long tables with chairs on one side.

After some jockeying for space nearer to Felicity, who was placed in the middle near the buzzer, they all sat. The other team sat at a similar table on the other side of the stage. Oliver squinted as he peered out into the audience—the front rows weren’t visible over the glare from the floodlights, but he thought he could see Walter and Mrs. Smoak further back, sitting next to each other and clapping furiously.

The proctor said, “As a reminder, each question is worth ten points—a correct answer adds ten points, and an incorrect answer subtracts ten points. We begin with a fifty-question first round. In the event of a tie, we continue on to a second round of fifteen questions. Teams, are you ready?” When the students said yes, she said, “Alright, let’s begin.”

Their team pulled into an early lead—Felicity beat the other team’s captain to the buzzer for the first two questions, and on the third he was so focused on being first to hit the buzzer that they got the answer wrong. St. Andrew’s quickly caught up, though, and the lead changed hands between the two teams several times. 

Oliver was pleased that he was able to contribute correct answers on a few vocabulary, history, and literature questions, although there were other literature questions, in particular, that they had to pass on because none of them had read the books in question. Fortunately, the other team only added ten points for that reason, although it still made Oliver think he needed to study more for next year. _Wait, next year? Was he going to keep doing this?_

The teams were tied when the proctor said, “We’ve reached our fiftieth and final question of the first round. The two teams are tied at 220 points apiece. The question is: what occurs when the velocity of an object changes?”

Felicity slammed down her hand on the buzzer.

“Team Chesterbrooke?”

“Acceleration,” Felicity, Ray, and Li said in unison.

“That’s correct! Chesterbrooke wins the northwest California sixth-grade Scholastic Challenge America competition and will continue on to the northern California championship in Sacramento with the winners of the other 53 districts on January 12, 1997. Congratulations!”

The audience burst into applause, and the team leaped out of their chairs, cheering and hugging each other.

Oliver hugged Ray, and when he let go Felicity was there waiting. She hugged him tightly, leaning up to say into his ear, “You did great, Oliver. We couldn’t have done it without you.”

“You did really great, too,” he said to her in return. They had a moment to look into each other’s eyes, the noise of the crowd fading out into the distance, before Li tapped Felicity on the shoulder to hug her, and then Oliver.

As the noise in the auditorium died down, the official said, “Students from St. Andrew’s, please return to your designated classroom to pick up your belongings. Chesterbrooke, we’d like to take a few team photographs, and then you may return to your classroom as well. Parents, St. Andrew’s is in classroom four on the blue wing and Chesterbrooke is in classroom three on the green wing. Chesterbrooke students and parents, the judges and I will join you in your classroom to congratulate you personally and impart some information about next steps.”

A volunteer had the Chesterbrooke team stand against the back curtain and took several photos, and then the led them off-stage, through the backstage area, and back through the halls toward their designated classroom. 

Their parents and the other Chesterbrooke teachers who’d attended the competition were waiting for them and began cheering and clapping when they walked into the classroom. The parents rushed forward to congratulate their children; Walter gave Oliver a big hug and said, “Your mother would be very proud of you. _I_ am proud of you—you really contributed a lot to the team.”

“Thanks.” Oliver felt a sudden pressure behind his eyes, but he wouldn’t cry, not today of all days. 

Walter lowered his voice. “Now, which one is your Felicity?”

“Let me introduce you to my teammates,” Oliver said heartily, and Walter winked before forming an expression of polite interest. They were standing near Ray, his mother, and his twin brother Sydney, so he introduced Walter to them first.

And since they were moving in that direction, he led Walter over to Felicity and her mom. He stopped cold, though, when he heard her mother say, “You haven’t told them yet?”

He jogged forward the last few steps to stand next to Felicity. “Told us what?”

“Oliver…” Felicity said, and she looked so sad that he just knew. 

Before he could say anything, though, the officials came in to congratulate them. He let their speeches wash over him, too miserable to pay attention. He vaguely heard them say something about Sacramento, but was distracted when he felt Felicity slip her hand into his. He looked over to her as she leaned her head against his shoulder, but then she pulled away from him as the officials and parents clapped for them again.

As the crowd began to dissipate, Felicity called out, “Wait!” When everyone turned to look at her, she said, “I just want everyone to know, this is my last competition with the team. I’m moving to Boston—I got into a STEM-focused school there. I- It’s been great being teammates with you guys. I’m really going to miss you.” She swiped under her glasses to wipe away her tears, and her mother patted her on the shoulder in sympathy.

Oliver managed to choke out, “I’ll miss you, too,” before letting himself be pushed aside as the other teammates rushed to hug Felicity and say their goodbyes.

Walter threw an arm around his shoulders. “So, she is moving. I’m sorry to hear that. She seems very nice, and her mother’s quite funny.”

Oliver watched her let go of Laurel to hug Ray. “This is a nightmare. She’s moving 3,000 miles away, I’m never going to see her again, and I never even told her how I feel.”

Felicity waved her final goodbye from the classroom doorway as she followed her mom out. Was Oliver imagining things, or did her eyes linger on him as she took in the team for a final time?

“It’s not too late. I think you should tell her now. You’ve got nothing to lose, and you’ll always regret it if you don’t,” Walter said.

Oliver said despairingly, “But she’s already gone!”

“And you’re on the track team. Run after her!”

Oliver nodded determinedly and began winding his way through the people still in the classroom, nodding at their greetings but not stopping, pretending not to hear Ray’s request for another photo. Once out the door, he started running down the hall, retracing his steps from that morning toward the parking lot. He passed a few volunteers who yelled, ‘slow down’ and ‘where’s the fire,’ but he ignored them and hit the doors at the main entrance at a sprint. 

It had begun to rain during the competition. He stopped under the overhang to squint through the downpour, but he couldn’t see much of anything.

As he jogged out into the rain he remembered that Felicity had gotten to the classroom at the last minute, so her mom was probably parked at the far edge of the parking lot. But which way?

Oliver saw a concrete bench up ahead, ran to it, and climbed up to stand on the seat. When he still couldn’t see, he used the lamppost next to the bench to climb up onto the top of the thick back of the bench. He peered out at the parking lot, one hand wrapped around the lamppost and the other shielding his face from the rain. With his increased height he was able to see over the cars parked near the entrance to catch a flash of yellow in the distance to his left.

A voice behind him yelled, “Hey kid, get down from there.” He turned to see a security guard standing under the overhang near the door, hands on his hips as he glared at Oliver.

Oliver hopped down to the seat, then down to the ground. He glanced back to see the guard had started walking toward him, but Oliver decided to ignore him and took off in the direction of the yellow jeep.

He ran through the parking lot, dodging students and parents and trying to avoid the puddles being formed by the rain. An SUV almost hit him when he didn’t see it backing up until the last minute, but he veered across the aisle and out of its path in time. He turned around once to see that the security guard had given up chasing him, which was a relief. 

Two-thirds of the way down the aisle, headlights turned on in the next row over where the jeep was parked. Oliver was still three cars from the end of the row when the jeep passed by. His heart sank, but he put on a burst of speed and sprinted to the end of the aisle and around the corner after the jeep. It would have to stop ahead at the stop sign before turning out onto the street, and he thought he might have a chance of catching up. 

But then the jeep slowed down and pulled into the next aisle and parked in the last space in the row. Felicity got out of the jeep and ran out to meet him. She opened a red umbrella and stepped close enough to shield them both from the rain. “Oliver! I thought it was you. I saw someone running and made Mom stop. Did I forget something in the classroom? I thought I got everything—I almost forgot my coat, but—”

“No, it’s not that,” Oliver panted out.

While she waited for him to catch his breath, she pulled off her glasses and tried to wipe them off on her shirttail one-handed, bobbling the umbrella and almost dropping the glasses. He took the umbrella from her, thrilling as their hands brushed, and she smiled gratefully before cleaning off her glasses and sliding them back on. “That’s better—now I can actually see you! So, why were you running after us?”

Oliver gathered himself for the most important speech of his life. “You didn't forget anything. I just, I've been meaning to tell you how I feel about you for a long time now. I think you're really pretty, and smart of course, and, and…I think I love you. No. I _do_. I love you, Felicity!”

“Oh!” Her eyes widened in surprise. “Oh, Oliver!” She threw her arms around him and hugged him tightly. He hugged her back with one arm while holding the umbrella out of the way above them.

“I…I like you, too. When I first got here, I thought, you know, that you were hot, but as a popular person, you were probably also a jerk who would make fun of me, like Max. But then you joined the academic team and I got to know you, and realized you have a good heart. But I still thought, popular guy, out of my league. And then I said yes to Carter, mostly as a distraction from you—”

“Really?”

“Yeah, and then…Oh, I just wish we had more time! I wish now that I hadn’t said yes to Boston!”

“You shouldn’t, though. You’re a genius, and you deserve a chance to use follow your dream.”

She looked at him, smiling even as tears welled up in her eyes, and then she wrapped her hands around his neck, raised up on her toes, and brushed his lips with hers. He pulled her closer and kissed her back, confirming that her lips were just as soft as he’d thought.

Oliver lost track of everything except Felicity until cold water hit his head and he realized he’d dropped the umbrella. They pulled apart, laughing, and Oliver picked the umbrella back up. Felicity’s mom honked the horn.

“I have to go—the movers are coming at 3.”

“Oh, wow, so you’re really going right now.” Oliver started to panic a little.

“Yeah. Come with me.” She held out a hand and he took it, allowing himself to be pulled toward the jeep. “Just one more minute,” she said to her mom as she reached into her backpack and pulled out a notebook with a red cover like her umbrella.

She flipped to an empty page and said, “Do you have an e-mail account?”

“No, I never bothered with one.”

As she was writing, she said, “This is my e-mail account. Once you make an account we can e-mail each other whenever we want.” She folded the piece of paper again and again into a small square. “OK, I’ve got a couple of layers of blank paper protecting the ink. Do you have anywhere relatively dry to put it?”

“Um…” He looked down at himself, sopping wet from his run. “Inside jacket pocket, maybe.” He unbuttoned the sports jacket that was part of the Chesterbrooke uniform and held open one side. 

She felt the pocket, then placed a hand on his chest. “Actually, your shirt pocket is drier,” she said breathlessly. She slid the folded paper inside his shirt pocket and patted it in place a few times. 

Her attention was caught by something over his shoulder. “Oh, there’s your stepdad, with an umbrella.” They shifted so they could both see him in the distance, walking toward them under an oversized umbrella.

“I’ll wait until he’s a little bit closer and I can run back without getting too much wetter. I know your mom wants to go, and I should go before I start crying.”

“If you start crying, I’ll definitely cry. Oh, I’m going to miss you!” She hugged him again, burying her head against his shoulder.

“But we’ll keep in touch. I like talking to you.”

“I like talking to you, too.”

Watching Walter, Oliver decided, “I think he’s close enough. I’m going to run for it. Felicity, I…”

Their eyes met, and then they kissed one last time.

“OK, I really need to go,” Felicity said. “Write to me; I’ll try to check if I have access in hotels, otherwise it might have to wait until I can get access at the public library in Boston, and I’ll get a card as soon as I can.”

“OK. I’ll try to be patient. Uh, have a good trip.” He tried to make it a statement, but it sounded more like a question.

“Six days in the car with my mom, so probably not,” Felicity said with an eye roll. She kissed him one more time on the cheek and said, “OK, go.”

Walter was only a dozen steps away, so Oliver ran for it, and Walter tipped his umbrella to cover them both as soon as he got close enough. 

Oliver immediately pulled Felicity’s e-mail address out of his pocket. “Can you hold on to this and keep it dry? I don’t want the ink to run.”

Walter tucked the paper in his coat pocket. “Felicity’s contact information?”

Oliver smiled. “Yeah. She likes me, too! We’re going to be, like, pen-pals, but with e-mail.”

“Excellent.” Oliver and Walter watched the jeep back out of the parking space and turn toward the road out of the school’s parking lot. They both waved until the jeep was no longer visible, and then Walter clapped a hand on Oliver’s shoulder. “Let’s go home and get you set up with an e-mail account.”


	5. Epilogue

_August 2003_

It was move-in day for freshmen at Harvard University, and Oliver was lying in bed in the Queen-Steele family’s hotel suite, too excited to sleep.

Oliver was proud to have been accepted into Harvard. It was his dad’s alma mater, and between that and the Queen family fortune, he probably would have gotten in regardless. Still, he had worked hard in middle and high school and was confident that he could actually handle the workload at Harvard, and wouldn’t drop out after a semester or two like the rich partier he might’ve been if his life hadn’t taken that turn in the sixth grade.

He was excited about his classes, and he was excited to be living in the same city as Felicity. They’d kept up their friendship via e-mail, instant messaging, calling, and texting. They’d seen each other in person twice since she’d moved to Boston, once when she and her mom flew back to Starling for a week during the summer after eighth grade, and once during spring break of tenth grade when he’d convinced Walter to refuel and stop overnight in Boston on their way back from London. He’d missed her, though, on both his college visit to Harvard last fall and his orientation a few months ago, because she was involved in the robotics team at her school and was away at competitions both times (they were eventually awarded second place in the country for their creation).

But now, they’d be living within miles of each other, just two subway stops apart. They’d talked on the phone the previous week and had tentatively arranged to meet up the day after tomorrow, as he was moving in today and she was doing the same at MIT tomorrow. She’d already offered to show him around Boston. And, although he knew a tour by Felicity Smoak would focus more on libraries, book stores, and internet cafes than it would the famous city sights, he was still looking forward to spending time with her, even though he was nervous about how their relationship would change now that they were no longer just long-distance friends.

About three months after Felicity left Starling City, They’d had an extremely awkward conversation where they agreed they were just going to be friends as long as they lived on opposite coasts—it just wasn’t practical to long-distance date at their age, and Felicity thought they should both experience normal middle and high school things, including dating. He’d agreed reluctantly, because that made sense logically even if it wasn’t what his heart wanted. Regardless of who he had dated through the years, Felicity was the one he turned to when he was upset or had a problem he needed to talk through, as well as the first person, along with Tommy, who he wanted to call when he had good news.

Oliver looked over at the clock again. It was still early, but he could tell he wasn’t going to be able to fall back asleep. Instead, he snuck by his sister sleeping in the other bed and slipped into the suite’s bathroom to shower.

Two hours later they were on their way to Harvard, the three of them and his boxes and suitcases all crammed into a town car. They followed the directions he’d been e-mailed regarding where to park to be as close to his dorm as possible. 

The three of them and the driver loaded everything from the trunk onto two of the carts provided by the school. Oliver got his key from the office, then they waited in line for the elevator. They made their way to the third floor and found room 320, where his roommate and his parents were already unpacking.

After both families introduced themselves, his roommate Matt said, “Hey, since I got here first I just picked a side, but I don’t really care. You OK with this arrangement, or do you want to switch?”

“This is fine. I brought a TV and a DVD player like we agreed.”

“Great! We were just going to go out to the mall to get a fridge and microwave. Are you staying the night here or going back to your hotel for one more night?”

“Staying here, although I won’t be back until late, because we may have promised a certain someone a trip to the Zoo—”

“That’s me,” Thea broke in, giggling. “The zoo here has zebras and our zoo doesn’t. I’m so excited to see them! And then also the giraffes and the butterfly house if we have time?” She turned pleading brown eyes on Walter, who smiled and ruffled her hair.

“If Oliver’s OK with it, I’m OK with that as a plan for the day. We just need to swing by the bookstore and get Oliver’s textbooks, first.”

“Yay!” She jumped up and down. “Let’s hurry up and get unpacked then!”

After his roommate and his family left, Oliver, Walter, and Thea unpacked Oliver’s belongings. Thea focused on placing his books in alphabetical order on the bottom three shelves of the built-in bookcase, leaving the top three empty because his roommate might also have books. Walter organized his desk, while Oliver made the bed and organized his closet. 

They’d left the door open, and several of Oliver’s floor-mates and his RA stopped in to introduce themselves. The girls from room 318 down were flirty, and Oliver tried to signal his disinterest without being rude—they were cute, but he didn’t want to get tangled up with anyone until he and Felicity reunited.

Walter had moved on to the kitchen area. “We should find some somewhere to get you some groceries—not that you’ll cook a lot, but you should at least have sodas and water, and snacks.”

Oliver was sitting on the floor of the living area, setting up the TV. “I’ll ask Felicity when I see her this weekend. I’m sure she knows where to shop around here.” 

A voice said from the doorway, “Or I could just tell you now,” and Oliver looked up to see Felicity standing there grinning at him. “Thanks for the setup! I know we said Saturday, but I just couldn’t resist.”

“Felicity!” He sprang up and pulled her into a hug. “I can’t believe you’re here. I can’t believe _we’re_ here! I love the hair.”

She smoothed down the top of her newly blonde hair, pulled into a ponytail that hung halfway down her back. “Thanks. I resisted posting anything to Facebook this past week to avoid spoiling the big reveal. I like it—it’s a little more mature-looking than last year’s pink. Since, you know, college now…” she trailed off, looking flustered.

From his seat at Oliver’s desk, Walter said, “Miss Smoak, lovely to see you again.”

Thea came up and stood next to Oliver, and held out a hand to shake. “I’m Thea, Oliver’s sister. I was wondering if you were a real person!”

Felicity shook her hand while Oliver groaned, “You are so embarrassing.”

“I’m your little sister—that’s my job,” Thea replied. She asked Felicity, “Do you want to go with us to the zoo? They have zebras!”

“Um, well, it’s Oliver’s last opportunity to spend time with his family. I don’t want to horn in on that.”

“You should definitely come,” he said. “I mean, zebras, right? Not to be missed.” He was trying to be casually friendly, and to avoid staring at her beautiful face, much less allow his eyes to drift any lower.

“As long as we can skip the kangaroos—they scare me.” Felicity shuddered.

“That’s settled, then,” Walter said. “I think we’re about finished here. Why don’t I call for a car?”

Oliver said, “I need another five minutes to finish setting up the TV.”

“I have W-Z on the books, but I’m basically done,” Thea said. She picked up a stack and crammed it onto the bottom shelf. “There.”

“Thea, why don’t you and I go downstairs now and call our driver? I’m sure the cell phone reception is better outside.”

Thea looked puzzled but followed Walter out the door. Walter gave them both a genial smile as he shut the door behind himself, leaving Oliver and Felicity alone.

“That was subtle,” Felicity commented, looking down at the floor as her cheeks flushed.

Oliver said, “So what’s your plan for tomorrow? Are you going to spend the day with your mom?”

“No, it’s Friday so she has to work the dinner shift, 4-11. She’ll help me move in tomorrow morning but then I’m on my own. Why, do you want to hang out?”

“Yes.” Then he frowned and stepped closer. “No, that’s not it. Felicity, would you like to go out to dinner with me?”

Her eyes widened. “Are you asking me out on a date? Like a date-date?”

“Yes.”

“Then, yes!” She nodded vigorously. She threw her arms around him, and he hugged her back. He was leaning down to kiss her when their attention was drawn by the sound of a key turning in the door. 

“That’s probably my roommate,” he said as he pulled away slightly. The door opened and Matt and his parents wheeled in a cart with their dorm fridge and microwave balanced on top.

“Oh, hey,” Matt said, clearly startled by Felicity’s presence.

“Felicity, this is my roommate Matt Stapleton and his parents. Guys, this is Felicity Smoak, my…”

“Girlfriend,” Felicity finished for him as she stepped forward to shake everyone’s hand. She froze with her hand extended as if she realized what she’d just said. “Is that OK? I don’t want to presume—”

Oliver said, “Girlfriend is perfect.”

Matt said, “That was fast. You’ve only been here a couple of hours!”

Felicity wrapped a hand around Oliver’s forearm and leaned her chin against his shoulder, looking up at him adoringly. “I’ve been in love with Oliver for almost seven years. Trust me, this is anything but rushed.”


End file.
